The Hundred Years' War: Part 3 - Lancastrian War

A modern depiction of the Dauphin.

If you have found this blog by chance, saw the word 'Lancastrian' and read it as 'Lannister', I apologize but you are about to be sorely disappointed. This blog is about the third instalment of The Hundred Years' War, detailing the Lancastrian period in which we see such delightful characters as Joan of Arc (later represented by Lisa Simpson), the King of France (later represented by Milhouse Van Houten) and the King of England (later represented by a great number of boring and aesthetically displeasing paintings made during or after that century). The previous section of the war reminds us that history is no cohesive story, meant to entertain and follow a beginning, middle and end style narrative with a thrilling climax brought to us by Gerard Butler in slow motion. It's simply a retelling of events as they happen - in this case, the middle section (the Caroline war) was simply a number of battles and exchanges of territory, spicier than peacetime but not being altogether all that groundbreaking. I guess the burning and pillaging of the French countryside and the Fabian tactics to defeat the British were pretty cool, but.. I don't know. The addition of some interesting subplots (the king of England is secretly a woman! or every single battle turns into an underdog/last stand story in which the outnumbered win in a surprise victory!) would certainly have made it a little better. Fortunately, this one has a little more substance.

But anyways...

A civil war had started in France between the Armagnacs party and the Burgundians - two rivals in south and northern France, respectively. The first battle in the Lancastrian War went soundly to the British, the Battle of Agincourt being a strong victory for the English over the Armagnacs. Henry V, the king, continued on to win fight after fight and take greater levels of territory all the while spilling all sorts of French blood, not to be confused with wine, despite the high blood/alcohol level. At this point the French king, Charles VI, started to get a little weary of all this death and destruction rampaging across his homeland which would be more than a little bit of a downer. Fearing the worst, he was forced into a treaty with the British, stating that Henry was to marry his daughter (whoring out your daughters was socially acceptable back then, when women were pretty much political currency for alliance purposes). Anyone who was to marry the French princess would then be the one to take the French throne - this of course meaning that the Dauphin (which I have just now learned means the eldest son of the king of France - you're welcome for saving you a google search) no longer has a legitimate claim to the throne. We can only imagine that upon hearing that news the poor lad would be rather peeved.

Both sides quickly learn that arrows are not the only
form of weaponry that can be fired at unnecessarily
close range.

Henry V died sometime afterwards, as the French king followed suit. In the wake of the British king's death, his infant sone took what I can only imagine to be an adorable baby sized crown and made an alliance with the Burgundians who backed the young one. The Armagnacs, on the other hand, continued to support the French side of things and held out in the southern half of France.

Despite already losing a great number of battles and men, things continued to go downhill for France when at this point they thought the drop couldn't get much steeper. A French and Scottish army lost 16,000 men, the Scots being surrounded and destroyed along with their commanders, marking the last time major reinforcements would come to France from Scotland. Losing allies, fighting a civil war and the British, their leaders killed and their ranks scattered or dead as well, France was looking like they were on the brink of annihilation. In fact, Britain thought so too - they began to lay siege to the exceptionally well defended Armagnac capital of Orleans. Taking that would be a crippling blow to France.

Joan of Arc, nicknamed "The Maid of
Orleans"; she was the original French Maid.
Oh la la.

Like most great battles of history, the tides turned when one teenage girl started hearing voices in her head. Joan of Arc, after apparently having visions of God instructing her to defeat the British, convinces the Dauphin to send her to the siege. She then steps up to the plate, inspiring the troops through medieval pump-up music and paintings of montages, and rallies the broken French armies into a powerful fighting force. Hitting the small groups surrounding the city, she frees it from the siege and continues on to break the lines of English troops. This allows the Dauphin to march through to Reims and be crowned officially.

After leading a number of minor victories, Joan of Arc was eventually captured and burned at the stake as a witch, the British simply blaming the fact that they got out maneuvered by a girl on nothing short of magic. Regardless of her progress, the English still thought they would be able to maintain control of France and eventually succeed in the takeover. What was the real nail in the coffin for them was Burgundy eventually removing themselves as an ally, leaving them without adequate support to take over such a large territory with such a high number of people.

Thus ends the Hundred Years' War. Over a century of incredible battles summed up in three crappy, poorly informed blog posts.